February 25th, 1998

OAKLAND, CA -- A four year effort which resulted in a spectacular comeback in national ranking for the East Bay Merrill Lynch offices was formally recognized on Thursday, February 12th at an event coordinated by Tam Communications. The Oakland Paramount Theater provided a magnificent venue for the employee recognition festivities which culminated in a live performance by the Oakland Symphony to a pre-recorded videotape featuring employees at five East Bay Merrill Lynch offices.

The challenge of directing a fifteen member orchestra to accompany a videotape live in front of an audience of 250, was well understood by both Oakland Symphony's Conductor Greg Barber, and Tam Communications' Producer Michele Bertolone. Since preparation was crucial to the success of this unusual coupling, the conductor reviewed the video, edited to a "scratch" music track, several times before the day of the performance to get a sense for the timing.

Once the orchestra members arrived, they had only four hours to warm up, rehearse their timing of Copeland's Fanfare for the Common Man to the videotape, and execute their extraordinary performance during the event.

Commented the Merrill Lynch Resident Vice President, "The goal was to thank our people for an extraordinary job well done while at the same time motivate them to even greater performance. Testimony to the net effect of the program could be summed up in the singular word I've heard repeated over and over since that remarkable afternoon.....WOW!"

Tam Communications is a leading digital media company, servicing corporate and entertainment clients by combining technical, creative, and communications expertise in the realms of video, interactive multimedia, and web. The company's expanding spectrum of original entertainment programming—developed for broadcast, cable, syndication, and other venues—airs worldwide. Tam Communications is a privately held company located in Scotts Valley, CA. Please visit our web site at www.tamcom.com.